Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) member nations will not accept greenhouse gas emission targets to fight global climate change and creating energy-efficient economies is the way forward, Australia's environment minister said yesterday.
The Asia Pacific Economic Co-operation forum will focus on improving energy efficiency instead of setting gas emission reduction targets as the 1997 Kyoto Protocol did, Environment Minister Malcolm Turnbull told Australian Broadcasting Corp radio.
"Most of the fast-growing industrializing economies, China being the classic case ... are not going to agree to binding targets on the basis of the Kyoto model," Turnbull said.
The comments came a day after the environmental group Greenpeace said it obtained a proposed draft declaration circulated by Australia among APEC member states ahead of September's annual meeting in Sydney.
The draft said Asia-Pacific governments have been asked to improve energy efficiency and increase forest cover throughout the region to stop climate change.
However, no mention was made of mandatory targets to cut the amount of heat-trapping gasses released by human activity into the atmosphere.
Greenpeace criticized the plan saying without binding limits, climate change will continue.
"Business needs certainty and setting targets that mean people generally need to do better just aren't going to happen," Greenpeace energy campaigner Ben Pearson said yesterday.
Turnbull said focusing on energy efficiency -- such as redesigning buildings so they are less reliant on electric lighting and air conditioning -- was the way forward.
"The battle against global warming occurs on many fronts," he said. "If you use 25 percent less energy to get the same amount of economic product, then you've naturally ... made a very significant decrease in the amount of CO2."
According to the draft, APEC would agree to "work toward the goal" of reducing energy intensity -- the amount of energy used to create a gross domestic product -- by 25 percent by 2030.
It also described an "aspirational goal" of expanding forest cover across the APEC region by 20 million hectares by 2020.
Pearson described the energy efficiency plan as "business as usual," saying improved efficiency is inevitable in a growing economy.
In May, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change -- the UN network of more than 2,000 scientists -- released its fourth report, warning that global warming would increase the number of extreme weather events and cause more natural disasters that will hit the poor hardest.
Global surface temperatures in January were the highest since records began, according to the World Meteorological Organization.
Climate change will top the agenda at the annual APEC leaders' forum in Sydney in September.
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese